I'm having a problem with an Icy Box IB-110StUS2-B HDD docking station (USB/eSATA plug-in dock type) that I'd appreciate opinions on.

I've tried using this docking station with several Hitachi 250Gb SATA drives. All of these drives work perfectly well with other 351 series Icy Boxes that I have.

The problem is that when I use any of these drives in the IB-110, the drive seems to reset after any period of heavy activity longer than a couple of minutes. There is a head retraction click, and the power and activity LEDs go off for around 1s before the drive comes back online. This even occurs if the "activity" is a SMART offline "long" test, initiated from either USB or eSATA (Windows or DOS), so I don't think that data connection or drivers are the problem.

This seems to leave the PSU as the only remaining suspect, and it is a rather lightweight looking unit for the claimed 12V 2A rating (not to mention the unpleasant looking 2-pin to 3-pin mains adapter supplied with it).

My best theory is that the PSU can't quite handle the power level required for continuous activity for sustained periods, it overheats and resets. Supporting this is the fact that the power LED blinks off during the reset, whereas it doesn't during a PC warm reboot.

So far, I haven't had any data loss from this problem but, having identified that it exists, I'm not happy at continuing to risk it. As soon as I can find a suitable alternative PSU, I'll test it out, but 12V at 2A is quite a high rating and I don't have another one lying around.

Has anyone else had similar problems? Alternative theories? Any thoughts would be welcome.

Thanks,

gvm

Does the power light on the PSU turn off or the power light on the enclosure? Do you have it connected through USB or eSata?
Try eSATA and disable hot swapping in the BIOS (if possible) and boot with the drive connected.
And check if power management is enabled (allow this device to turn off to conseve power ... or whatever it's called)

Modern PSUs (Switching) can be very light, so I doubt this should concern you. However an expert might have a differnent opinion :p

There is only one LED - on the unit itself. There isn't one on the PSU.


I've tried both - no difference. Also, the problem occurs during SATA offline tests, so no data transfer is occurring at the time.


Not sure what that would prove - the fault happens with SMART offline tests (initiated through either USB or eSATA), so there should be no system<->drive activity at the point where the reset occurs (the offline test doesn't transfer data, just reads it within the drive and reports success or failure).

What this does suggest to me, however, is that I could disconnect the USB cable after initiating the offline test - the test should continue and the drive will presumably reset 2 minutes or so after the start of the test. I'm saying USB here because I'm more comfortable with pulling the USB from the running drive than the eSATA.


Power management is already disabled.


Yes, I appreciate that, but I mention it because this is a *very* lightweight looking PSU (not much larger than a phone charger), and 12V 2A is pretty hefty claim for a "wall wart".

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll let you know how the "total isolation test" works out.

gvm

Tried this - no change. The drive resets after 2 mins or so, just the same as before.



Surprisingly, this results in the offline SATA test continuing to completion (~1hr), or until the USB cable is reconnected (not too surprising that reconnection interrupts it). No resets after 2 mins. It could be that the power requirements are a tiny bit less if the USB connection is powered down, but that seems unlikely to be significant, so maybe the PSU isn't the problem after all.

Any suggestions, anyone?

gvm

I've got the same problem in eSata, not in USB.
I say the same, because after 2 minutes, the Icy Box 110 stUS2-b reset and the drives disappear.
In USB the copy is slow. It's strange to sell a product which doesn't work !
No solutions for now...